This
Day (Lagos)
EDITORIAL13 May 2007 Posted to the web 14 May 2007 Lagos

African
Brain Drain

A recent United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) report has revealed
that Africa is suffering
from massive brain drain. The manpower needed for the economic growth of the continent is being lost to outsiders.
According to the report, Africa, since 1990, has been losing 200, 000 professionals every year.
Consequently, the continent spends a whopping $4 billion every year in the employment of 150 expatriates to fill the
human resource gap created by this mass exodus of qualified Africans out of their continent .

This indeed is a
very worrisome report corroborated by the mass exodus of qualified Nigerians to America,
Europe and other more developed continents . Every day, our airports are crowded with our best
brains fleeing Nigeria in search of the so-called greener
pasture abroad. Foreign embassies in Nigeria are daily
swamped with young Nigerian talents scampering for visa to flee the country . The most regrettable aspect of the phenomenon
is that while Nigeria is in this sorry state, the economy
and technology of advanced countries are being driven by some Nigerian geniuses living abroad.

The tragedy of brain drain in Africa is that it is self-inflicted. Africa
cannot be complaining of the loss of its human capital when it lacks the enabling environment for the flourishing of this
essential capital. The continent is plagued from top to bottom by pervasive poverty, war, environmental hazards and
diseases. Social infrastrutural and institutional decay is another problem. In Nigeria,
for example, the supply of electricity is epileptic. But a worse problem besetting Africa which
is the principal cause of capital decumulation is unemployment. There are many young professionals roaming the African
streets without jobs. Faced with unemployment frustration, many of these jobless youth are lured into crimes.

Obviously,
without employment and job security, Africans in the disapora will not find the African soil attractive. That is why we
agree with the UNDP Administrator, Kemal Deris, that one of the greatest developmental challenges facing Africa
at the moment is to convert the pattern of growth in Africa into a pro-poor and economic-centered
growth. The elimination of poverty and satisfying of basic human needs in Africa will definitely
act as incentives to Africans in the diaspora to return home and get involved with the development of their respective
countries.

The economic policies in Africa should focus on
retaining the human capital needed for economic growth. A continent which is undergoing the process of decumulation
of its human capital largely due to socio-economic deprivations, is far from being an ideal continent for sustainable
democracy and human development.

Human beings are our hope of a better
Africa . Every society grows at its own pace according to the aspiration of its own people.
Impelled by the philosophy of Pan-Africanism, qualified Africans in the diaspora should head back home to develop
their continent. Home is home. If the mass exodus continues unabated, Africa will become a deserted
continent and foreigners will inherit our lands.

The challenge before African leaders therefore is to create the enabling
environment for its skilled man-power. That way, the incidence of braindrain will be greatly curtailed.